Song · Peter Gabriel
“Road To Joy” by Peter Gabriel
From the album i/o (2023)
“Road To Joy” by Peter Gabriel appears on 13 radio countdowns from 10 stations between 2023 and 2025. It was first released in 2023 on the album i/o. Its best result is #5 on the WXPK Top 107 Songs of 2023. In the combined RockLists rankings it is the #7 indie & aaa song of 2023, #4,728 indie & aaa song of all time and #61 of the '20s.
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Peter Gabriel's "Road to Joy" arrived in June 2023 as the sixth single from i/o, his tenth studio album, but its roots reach back to the OVO days of 2000, when it was a sketch called "Pukka" built on a piano loop, a resonant bassline, drums and synth stabs. Gabriel dusted it off because he liked its groove and energy, and took it to Real World Studios to play with rhythms alongside Brian Eno, who co-produced.
The finished track is a jittery, joyous rush: Tony Levin on bass, Manu Katché on drums, John Metcalfe arranging the strings, Josh Shpak on trumpet and French horn, and the Soweto Gospel Choir raising the roof, with Eno on ukulele and Gabriel on charango, the ten-string instrument from the Andes. Mark "Spike" Stent mixed it, and Gabriel took it on the road that year on I/O The Tour.
Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.
RockLists rankings
Indie & Adult Alternative
All Rock Formats
Year-end countdowns
| Year | # | Station | Countdown | of |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2023 | 26 | WTMD Baltimore, MD | WTMD Top 89 Songs of 2023 | 89 |
| 2023 | 14 | KXT Dallas–Fort Worth, TX | KXT Top 91 Songs of 2023 | 91 |
| 2023 | 5 | 107.1 The Peak Westchester County, NY | WXPK Top 107 Songs of 2023 | 107 |
| 2023 | 50 | WXPN Philadelphia, PA | WXPN Top 100 Most Played Songs of 2023 | 100 |
| 2023 | 19 | WFUV New York, NY | WFUV Top 90 Songs of 2023 | 90 |
| 2023 | 15 | WYEP Pittsburgh, PA | WYEP Top 91 Songs of 2023 | 91 |
| 2023 | 69 | Indie 102.3 Denver, CO | Indie 102.3 Top 102.3 Songs of 2023 | 98 |
| 2023 | 31 | 90.9 The Bridge Kansas City, MO | 90.9 The Bridge Top 90 Songs of 2023 | 90 |
| 2023 | 64 | Lightning 100 Nashville, TN | Lightning 100 Top 200 Songs of 2023 | 200 |
| 2023 | 27 | WERS 88.9 Boston, MA | WERS Top 88 Songs of 2023 | 88 |
All-time and decade countdowns
| Year | # | Station | Countdown | of |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2024 | 470 | WYEP | WYEP Best Songs of the Past 50 Years | 1049 |
| 2024 | 529 | WXPN | WXPN The 885 Greatest Songs of the 21st Century (2024) | 885 |
| 2025 | 136 | WYEP | WYEP Best Songs of the 21st Century (So Far) | 714 |
Also listed as: Road to Joy.
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